Bitcoin mining heats up Russian cottage for free

Nov 09, 2017, 6:57 AM EST

(Source: Marko Ahtisaari/flickr)

The backend computer processing in Bitcoin transactions generates a whopping amount of heat that’s usually dissipated in the environment. Is there a lucrative way to utilize this energy? The answer is yes.

Siberian entrepreneurs Ilya Frolov and Dmitry Tolmachyov are putting this energy to work by heating up their 20 square-meter home for free and in the process, making about $5,000 annually, notes Quartz.

Bitcoin “mining” machines continually verify if a chunk of transactions, called blocks, is valid and should be added to the blockchain, which is a power-hungry process estimated to consume as much energy as Denmark by 2020, writes Inhabitat.